The graph of Visa (since my purchase) is *really* starting to look like my cash graphs now lol

So was surprised to see that my poker money is actually still up 2% ...

Something else that was super interesting to see today, about Amazon - even though it dropped 9% after Trump got elected, it looks like it's already about bounced right back?

Guess ...

LESSONS:

1. Short-term: Wonder if maybe the day-to-day swings of stocks can be especially wide, because of all the activity of short-term investors, like day traders, looking for the most minute of edges? So guess it's 'normal' for decent stocks to gain or lose 2-4% a day, for several days ... and then go in the opposite direction just as fast?

2. Long-term: Will have to remember that while there's some similarities between investing in stocks and poker, guess stocks aren't fully a zero sum game - so if one buys stocks with the long-term in mind, or ETFs or index funds, they should all provide a return over time?

3. Owning More than One Stock: Warren Buffett doesn't actually advocate diversification as a way to minimize risk - guess since he believes the focus should be on trying to find solid companies, which should each be able to do well? But after seeing Visa drop 2% today while the Dow is reaching new heights, it kind of feels like ideally it'd be nice to own may 5 or 10 different stocks, so if there's a lot of swings in the day-to-day, hopefully on the whole things may be a bit smoother?

Was able to get the garbage out early today, make a quick casserole, and the dishes are already done - so will be nice to have lots of time to work on stuff tonight. Night 2 of the Dancing With the Stars finale starts at 8pm, so that should be fun to watch as well lol ...

Decided to try to go back to keeping the dopey stuff to a minimum, to try and keep this thread a little bit cleaner - just a couple more things first though!

Really enjoyed watching this ceremony of Pres. Obama award the Medals of Freedom today - guess Robert DeNiro and Robert Redford are actors, but they also established popular film festivals, which help advance the arts. And Ellen's got her talk show on every day, but when she came out 20 years ago it hurt her career for several years, and now gay marriage is legal. And Bill and Melinda Gates have given away $38 billion with their foundation, trying to improve living conditions around the world.

Guess it's nice to see people trying to make the world a better place And nice to see them rewarded for their efforts too ... also, "actors, like the guy from Space Jam" LOL, so funny

Some of the factors that may affect the performance of a company[/COLOR]

The company - including management

The environment - including customers

The industry at large

The general economy

The political climate

1-3: www.zacks.com
4-5: www.realclearmarkets.com

The www.realclearmarkets.com site seems to have a nice selection of articles from around the internet, with all different perspectives - so hopefully there's enough there to cover all the important info of the day?

And have just been looking at the research reports on www.zacks.com, with the list pros and cons for each company - hopefully that's an okay way to learn a bit more about lots of different companies in a really short time?

Something haven't found too helpful have been articles that give advice on whether to buy or sell specific stocks - for example, there's a one writer on www.fool.com who's been writing articles recommending Amaya about once a month - here's some exceprts from the articles ...

Amaya Inc. is really hot, firing on all cylinders ... People like the games and continue to play them.

Quote:

buying shares at this price is an amazing opportunity, and with the recent drop, you can get more bang for your buck ... there is much growth to come

Quote:

I’m a believer that you only invest in a company because the fundamentals are sound, and if an acquisition happens, that’s just more great news. The company is killing it ... All in all, the business is pretty solid.

Was also seeing some interesting stuff for Amazon - they had an 'off year' in 2014, losing 20% while 'the market' was up 8%, so was seeing a ton of articles like this one ...

Can understand why people would be skeptical about what might be in store for the company next after having a down year, but here's Amazon's graph for 2015, 2016, so it looks like the assessment of Amazon's future prospects was way off ...

So, will see how relying on those two sources goes for now - my books haven't arrived in the mail yet, but have those as well ...

May try to take a closer look at each of these tomorrow - just found out that Tax Free Savings Accounts can also be used to buy stock ... that really surprised me, since it's called a 'savings account' and not a 'stock account' lol Anyways, guess it'd be nice to find other stuff that hopefully looks promising ...

It sounds like government deregulation's a bit controversial - guess some people believe that regulations are unduly burdensome? So will have to double-check everything and hopefully be able to add more notes tomorrow about what might have gone wrong with the companies in these industries. Maybe worth spending more time on, if Donald Trump may deregulate more industries when he takes office?

Was reading that after the original 'Black Friday' (the stock market crash of 1929 that ushered in the Great Depression), US Congress wound up enacting a slew of regulations they believed could have lessened/limited the damage done during the big market crash ¹,²,³. So they focused their regulations on industries that provide vital services, where companies tend to wind up being big and monopolistic due to the high costs involved - banks (finance), power (utilities), cable (telecommunications).

So guess if a lot of regulations were put in place after Black Friday to try and prevent market crashes, and some of these regulations get removed - maybe there's always a chance some big important companies could go bankrupt, and the market could wind up in a downswing/crash?

Quote:

Originally Posted by TrustySam

Guess between 2001-2003, the bankruptcies in the telecommunications and utilities sectors were only part of the cause of the recession (the part in red ... about 40%) - with the other part being because of the dot-com bubble bursting, and 9/11?

Quote:

Originally Posted by TrustySam

And guess in 2008-2009 the bankruptcies in the finance industry were were only about 75% of the crash ... with the other part being the bursting of the credit/housing bubble?

LESSON: Perhaps it might be helpful to pay close attention to what regulations wind up getting overturned by the Trump administration - to see if any of the regulations were put in place after the great stock market crash of 1929, to prevent stock market crashes? (not a universally accepted viewpoint ¹)

It was great, because it had some smaller companies on the list of 'Stocks to Buy for 2017' - and the writer seem to try to find stocks with different risk levels?

The recommendation that had me really excited was this one for ULTA, which has *just* grown out of the 'Mid Cap' category:

Had forgotten that Mid-Cap stocks are supposed to tend to have better returns than Large-Cap stocks - because they have so much more room to branch out and grow?

Was looking at the company's website, and they look really good! It looks like they sell cosmetics like Sephora, but they've also got a hair salon, and a spa that uses Dermalogica products - and the prices are really reasonable. Bet it's a big hit!

And look at it's growth since going public! ULTA > Visa?

The writer also recommended Tinder lol - guess they're a Mid-Cap company as well. Looks like they've only been public for a year, but so far so good ...

The companies are so small, www.zacks.com doesn't have research reports for them - will have to check to see if there are any in the TD free library?

Have seen a bunch of things written about healthcare maybe doing especially well under a Trump administration. There's this healthcare stock that's part of the Dow, that looks like another possibility?

There's a Zack's report for it too - the report says they make a lot of $ from Medicare/Medicaid and an aging population ...

Speaking of Zack's reports, am working on downloading the rest of the Zack's library of research reports So maybe after have finished that, may post links to the reports? Other than that, guess that's it for the next while - my books are supposed to be arriving from Amazon tomorrow, so will probably just burrow in and read a bunch of stuff for the next while

Warren Buffet’s portfolio consists of 44 publicly traded companies. The vast majority of them (32) provide dividends, a number of which provide annual dividends in excess of four percent. Below is a list of the 10 highest-paying dividend stocks in Warren Buffet’s portfolio.

Hadn't heard that Warren Buffett was especially fond of dividend-paying stocks - dividends were on my list of stuff to take a closer look at ... however the list is getting pretty long now Guess learning takes a while

Will have to try to bump it up in priority - guess if one can find stocks that are growing in value *and* giving dividends, that'd be like having cake and eating it too? Could see how they'd be awesome for someone who's managed to save up like a $1mil retirement fund over the years - so then a 4% dividend would pay out ... would it be $40k a year? And then if the $1mil's still growing in value too, that'd be a pretty sweet deal

Maybe are there other benefits too - like if the economy tanks, maybe dividend stocks might feel especially nice to have, if there's a return coming in from the dividends, even when the stock value might be shrinking?

Remember seeing something about dividends tending to be paid out by more established companies, so my Visa has a little dividend (just a tiny one), but Amazon didn't have any.

Will have to read up some more on dividends, sooner rather than later - am feeling a bit under the weather, so may be able to look over some stuff over the weekend ... thanks for the tip tearfulrevered!!

ScreaminAsian is banned for posting porn, but there are more of us reading, keep the good work Sam.

-If you want bargains come shop here you can prob buy half the Belgrade with your paycheck.
They even picked up Black Friday and all stuff, and are ofc doing/ advertising it stronger than, US sellers...

Everything is decorated for weeks now and the Orthodox calendar is even two weeks lagging after Westerlings'...

Really enjoy looking at photos from different parts of the world, to see all the beautiful sights and events - Belgrade looks beautiful!! Especially at Christmas time

You're so lucky to have an outdoor pedestrian mall ... and that bread must be good - looks like the kid in the corner couldn't resist trying a piece, lol

My investing books arrived in the mail, and one of them looks especially good - just in the nick of time, because this thread was starting to go downhill with all my scattered focus It's this book here ...

Am really liking how organized the book is, and how the writer seems to know what might be helpful for beginners to learn, and explains things in simple language?

Am not feeling so great, so was going to maybe take a nap for a little while lol Then may try to go out to the store to get a highlighter pen, and try to take some notes and stuff this afternoon - will be so nice to have a little 'textbook' to help with the learning in a more organized way

Still downloading those research reports from Zacks too - may be able to post some of those first?

hot tip:
steve wynn is a billionaire casino owner as i'm sure you know. he's been very vocally supportive of republicans for a long time and trump seems like he's seeking the advice of billionaires. WYNN is up 16% since the election

Wanted to create a blog filled with cat pic and vids - it would have been so epic!! Was reading the rules of this section up top though, and it looks like it's only one blog per person, so this thread is it for me and the cat thread won't be possible ... that's very sad lol ...

Hadn't noticed the WYNN stock, but saw Sheldon's doing really well this year and about fell off my chair - people must be having lots of fun in Vegas this year Although it's unfortunate people are having fun at Sheldon's The GPL finals are supposed to be starting in Vegas in a couple of days - am still watching the GPL ... the quality of poker's amazing. Go Nationals!!

They were saying on the news that Justin Trudeau's in Cuba, and gave Fidel Castro a call and asked if he wanted to meet up - and he said he wasn't feeling well. But yesterday the President of Vietnam rang him up, and Fidel told him to come on over - it feels like 'we' just got snubbed by Fidel

Speaking of Visa and credit cards, looks like there's a big dust-up with the Airmiles program - guess the airmiles are going to be expiring from now on, after 5 years?

Gosh, it seems like have been saving them forever - and *still* only have about enough to pay for a free bus trip to Mississauga? Guess that means with my spending habits, it's unlikely will ever save enough miles to ever actually go anywhere - or ... maybe that means, am hardly saving miles at all?

Was looking around at all the other reward and cash back credit cards to see what else is available - it may be time for one of these

Guess it's only 1% cash back like everybody else - but they email coupons for free stuff every weekend, like donuts, soup, sandwiches ... also tea, coffee, cookies ...

There were also these super cute little cards at BMO! It sounds like there's an option to donate some/all of the cash back to the charity, and get a tax receipt? Guess for me that wouldn't be much But maybe something'd be better than nothing?

Was relieved to see this book cover some of the same things had found myself on the internet - and in kind of the same order too even ...

While stocks seem a bit risky/scary, they provide the best return over time

A return is any amount the stock grows in price over time, plus dividends

'The Market' - is a group of 30 big companies, like McD's, and Coke

Money's made from finding stocks that grow over time and/or are selling cheap

Then in Chapter 2, author spends a gigantic amount of time looking at big investors, and their approaches - looks like there's Warren Buffett, and then there's others too ... Benjamin Graham, Phlip Fisher, Peter Lynch, William O'Neil, Bill Miller?

Chapter 4 takes a closer look at trying to find stocks that will provide good returns, and also tries to look for signs of impending downswings.

And Chapter 6 talks about (online) research materials (and what to look for?)

New Stuff

The two things that are new are:

Looking at all those statistics, like P/E ratio

And how to set up an organized worksheet, to keep on top of things

What's interesting, is that the author starts looking at the statistics by *page 20*, in the middle of Chapter 1. While this thread is already practically on page 20 from cat photos, but have yet to take a closer look at the P/E ratio

Guess the statistics are important, because there's been times like during the internet boom, when the graphs of share prices went through the roof for companies that had yet to show any profit? So maybe the stats are the more reliable way to measure how a company's doing?

Have been dragging my heels with the stats - but guess they're important, so will try to look at them tomorrow in the book

Once that's done, can start posting the library of research reports (from Zacks), and practice taking a closer look at the stocks to give the stuff from the book a try

Surprised to still be up - guess the cold medication helped with the congestion ... forgot Trump was in Home Alone 2 Guess that's enough for today